cows produce 50 million metric tons per year of methane gas (you work out from where from) and methane gas is 23x more harmful to the enviroment than carbon dioxide... thus cows do more damage than a range rover

Yes methane is something to be considered. Permaculture enthusiasts have a very endearing attitude to problems like this. They turn the whole thing around and make an asset out of a problem.

In more advanced countries than ours, and here I refer to those that don’t have governments that solely speak of the environment but do nothing about it, this valuable asset is utilised as a fuel to generate electricity, to energise heat and power schemes and even, please note motor- head Jeremy Clarkson, to fuel cars.

So we take a waste gas that is “23x more harmful to the environment than carbon monoxide” (I take it he means carbon dioxide) when released directly into the atmosphere, collect it, use it as a fuel and the resulting pollution is less than that which would be produced by the fuel (petrol, oil, coal) it replaces.

Methane is also produced in great amounts by landfill sites which can be tapped into. Sewage works can be arranged to be energy sufficient by “digesting” the sewage. It is a win win situation, but why aren’t we doing more of it?

This is just one of the fuel sources we must get to grips with if we are going to combat global warming.

So that gives a valid reason for not exterminating our cows and on the contrary raises their value in being part of our solution. Now perhaps Homer would like to give a valid reason for anyone driving 10,000 miles a year in a gas guzzler when a more efficient car would do just as well or even better travelling by train, bus, bike or walk_________________It's later than you think

From an article by Toby McDonald in the Sunday Times of December 04, 2005 entitled "War on climate change targets flatulent cows"

BRITISH scientists are fighting climate change by reducing the harmful greenhouse gases produced by flatulent cows.
Researchers claim that by altering the diet of cows they can cut the animals’ emissions of methane — a contributor to global warming — by up to 70%. Scientists and green groups concerned about climate change have traditionally focused their efforts on cars, lorries, power stations and factories that burn fossil fuels and produce millions of tons of carbon dioxide.

But a study by French scientists published this year warned that flatulent farm animals must shoulder some of the blame. There are 1.4 billion cows worldwide, each producing 500 litres of methane a day and accounting for 14% of all emissions of the gas.

Carbon dioxide is by far the biggest contributor to climate change, but methane has 23 times the warming potential of CO2 so reducing its emission is also considered important.

In Scotland, where there is a greater concentration of agriculture than in other countries, cows produce 46% of all methane emissions. Now scientists at the Rowett Research Institute in Aberdeen say they have developed a diet that has done the most to reduce the amount of methane produced by cows.

They introduced a food additive, a mixture of organic sugars and a bacterium developed at the institute, into the cows’ diet. It is based on fumaric acid, a naturally occurring chemical essential to respiration of animal and vegetable tissues.

“In some experiments we got a 70% decrease in methane emissions, which is quite staggering,” said John Wallace, a biochemist at the institute who is leading the research team. In total about 14% of global methane comes from the guts of farm animals. It is worth doing something about.”

The study has received £150,000 funding from Scottish Enterprise, the government agency, and a 12-month commercial and scientific evaluation of the additive is under way. Wallace said if the tests were successful, the treatment would have a significant impact on cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

Cows need to ferment their low-grade food, such as hay and grass, to get any energy from it and the main by-product is methane.

Between 9% and 12% of the energy that a cow consumes is converted into methane, depending on diet, barn conditions and whether the cow is producing milk. The problem of wind is an expensive one for farmers — producing methane instead of milk or beef means that 10% of cattle feed is wasted.

Now, what can we feed to Range Rovers to reduce their emissions ?? _________________it's never too late

Yet again it seems jeremy clarkson is to blame for everything wrong with cars. Cars are a necessary part of everyday life, we could not function as a modern country with strong economic growth without them, the public transport system is a joke anyway... prehaps exempting the london underground

Cars provide many people... myself included with great enjoyment and if saving the world required people to give up such fundamental rights such as transport... maybe its not a world worth living in

According to Professor Lovelock, the creater of the Gaia principle. (that planet earth is a self regulating, closed system) it is too late.

'The world has already passed the point of no return for climate change, and civilisation as we know it is now unlikely to survive'

With China and India developing their 'western industrial' lifestyles, funded by western business investments, and with the good old USA thumbing their collective nose at everyone, we are wasting our time with recycling, energy conservation and cow diets!

His view is that conscientious governments should be working out how their population will survive when the temperate zones turn into desert.

Coming from anyone else this would be laughable, unfortunately he has been right before.

Probably time for collective cognitive dissonance and try not to worry about our grandchildren and their children

Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow............ _________________Just do it!

to scott we have not reached the point of no return that is 32 years 4 months 3weeks 2days away,i know, ive been there.vote B.O.P.HAPPY DAYS _________________If you see a lonely figure wandering, what appears to be aimlessly, around the cricket square on a piece of machinery - that will probably be me !